1988 set of Economists from the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, has urged the Federal Government not to devalue the naira but reduce cost of governance to rebuild the economy. The spokesman of the 1988 graduates of Economics, ABU, Mr Isiaq Ajibola, gave the advice on Saturday in Abuja at the annual meeting of the set. He said the best ways to rebuild the economy was to cut cost, saying that the government had demonstrated competence in that direction in its recent decisions. Ajibola, who is also a director in Daily Trust Newspapers, described the Treasury Single Account (TSA) policy of the government as a very nice concept. He said that they as economists believed with time the economy would improve with the introduction of the TSA. “We all know that the economy of the country is on the down side largely due to drop in oil revenue. “The President so far has resisted a lot of things and one of such is the devaluation of the naira. “ We urged the President to continue in that light, we do not want devaluation of the naira. “If we continue that way and the Minister of Finance, in-line with government’s vision, manages finance of the country well, we will all be fine at the end of the day,’’ he said. He explained that the vision of the association was to reunite the set after a very long time and be useful to one another. In addition, he said that the vision of the association was to continue to give back to the university and the society with unity of purpose as a class. Ajibola said the set had aligned itself with the ABU Alumni Association to key into the activities of the mother body. He said Alumni had helped many universities abroad and in some cases Alumni had also sustained their institutions, expressing hope to replicate the gesture in ABU. In his remarks, the Vice President of the set, Mr Simon Jatto, said that the issue of raising enough funds to manage the affairs of the country was becoming a challenge. Jatto said it was also another challenge to convince Nigerians to pay their taxes as people were reluctant to pay. He, therefore, advocated increase in awareness for tax payers in the country. “If people see what is being done with what they pay as tax, a lot of people will be willing to comply and it will increase revenue for the country,’’ he said.
NAN
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